St George trip and driving back to CO

The title pretty sums up the activities but not the feelings.

It was just a great trip to st george with tara. I had such a great time with her and it was so much fun.

We got to talking about our past on the way down to st george. I learned so much. And it seriously just FLEW by. LIke the shortest drive in my life. I didn’t want it to be over.

We stopped and got tacos in Cedar City. We left a $100 bill in the tip jar which was fun. We stopped and hiked on the way. It was a cool hike!

We stopped in pioneer park. Not as fun. We checked into our hotel, Red Mountain Resort. It was supposed to be like a yoga retreat, but it wasn’t quite as Yoga-ee as I remember. Adn the “healthy food” wasn’t as good as I remembered. But it was still nice. Our room was great. I upgraded to the villa, a big room with a king sized bed and a fireplace.

Then we hit the spa. Really just a steam room and sitting room and fancy shower. And the mens steam room was broken but it was still fun. WE relaxed a bit and then hit dinner at the resort. It was a nice pasta and pork chop (well pork chop wasn’t done all the way – yuck!). We walked back and decided to watch spiderman far from home. To continue the theme of Christmas of Spiderman. Tara hadn’t seen it yet! Well we watched half of it then read in bed.

We slept till like 830 Tuesday morning! We played around and then we were going to hit the weight room in the morning but MEH. So we had to rush to get to breakfast which was a bit of a disappointment. Not near as good as I remember. Then we walked and picked up some bikes that we were going to bike into Snow canyon. It was only a 5 mile each way bike but it was uphill and not easy. But it was tons of fun to bike into the canyon instead of walking into the canyon. It was beautiful. Not too cold with hat and gloves.

We biked as back as far as we could on the west canyon dirt path and then came back to the hike on the west trailhead of the lava tubes. Up and over the lava tubes and the petrified sandstone and then back. Probably a two hour hike at least and super interesting over and around so many different features. We were hungry at this point so we went to Tias Bakery and ate tacos and Papusas. It was okay. We came back and rested for a bit and then relaxed in the hot tub for awhile. Showered in the massive shower and then went off to dinner, at the resort again. This time was simple, chicken and steak. I thought they were fine. Dessert was peachy rings, honey corn twists, and chocolate we had gotten from the store. We finished watching spiderman far from home.

Wednesday morning. Our last day in st george. Woke up to more snuggling. But tara was still during her period so we had to improvise. Still plenty of fun. We hit the weights, tara rocked the yoga, I found a cool medicine ball rebounder. Then we hit the pool. It was an indoor pool just under 25 yards. But it was amazing. The water was crystal clear and didn’t smell of salt or any other chemicals. It was such a unique pool experience. I loved it. After that we got ready to hike and headed out for breakfast and hiking. Breakfast was at the “garden gai goddess” or something like that and it was apsolutely fabulous with a community journal, avocado toast, and acai bowls. If I were to open something in boulder/erie it would be a place like that. Just open for breakfast and lunch. Limited menu. But good at what it does. Probably our best meal of the trip.

We then went to hike to HELLHOLE . Sounds scary. It was just west of where we stayed, like one canyon west of snow. And… it was also great. So fun to hike up the riverbed and then into this canyon that I

thought was just as cool as Zion. The scenery was amazing. Just a great time and a great hike. And the weather was great. Sun even came out. The weather for this one was supposed to be rainy and crappy this entire trip but it ended up being really nice the entire time. We came back and were hoping to have plenty of time to crash but had to jump back to the spa for our massages. I went first at 3 then was tara at 4. We alternated in the steam room while the other was in the massage. Steam room was nice but SO intense.

We texted the kids to check in and this is the response we got:

Then we had to rush to get to dinner and our movie. To complete the christmas of spiderman we were going to see the new spiderman in the only theater in town. So we rushed to this indian place that was PACKED AND PACKED iwth people. They said they would get us in in 5 minutes. And nobody moved in 5 minutes. We waited 20 then had to leave. And then had to eat costa vida😞 Bleh. Then to spiderman in the tiny theater which was okay. I didn’t like it! Tara loved it. I thought it was NOT well done, like the first two were. I didn’t think they were near as funny or clever as the first two. Like it was just obvious. This was heresy to my kids who all loved it. We came home and ate our snacks in bed and called it good.

Apparently boulder county was on fire. Not a wildfire, like a firestorm sweeping through suburban neighborhoods of superior and broomfield. Entire neighborhoods, just gone. People had only minutes to escape the fire. Unbelievable that more people were not hurt. We were glued to the news. This was unlike anything we’ve ever seen before or even heard of. A suburban firestorm just doesn’t happen. 1000 homes burnt. Feelings of sadness for these people. gratitude that injuries were minimal (given the circumstances) and that things weren’t worse. But what an awful day for everyone around. It made us really want to get home. Which is why we left in the snow when things weren’t great. That evening nat and Michael came over and we ate lasagna and played cover your assets. Then packed up for the night, and even fit blakes’s lacrosse rebounder in the top of the highlander.

Friday morning. Wake up to find that I80 is closed in Rock Springs. But it was supposed to open so we set out. Things were okay going at first. Then in evanston the freeway was a mess of snow, going like 30 miles per hour. Things got better finally towards rock springs, but that’s where the road was sstill closed. It was supposed to open earlier, but now it said it could be 4-6 hours. We pulled off and drove around and decided to see a movie and decide what to do then. We went int he small tiny theater and got tickets for Sing 2. I told the person that my daughter has a 5 pound emotional support dog (gesturing with my hands to the approximate size of dash). The young teenager looked to her left at the old teenager who shrugged and said “yeah you’re fine”. So we all watched sing 2. Even Dash. We came out and drove to Jimmy Johns. We were just about to run in when we checked the traffic and it said “ROAD OPEN!” we ran in and got our food because we wanted to make it. Well we made it, but it was tricky. First was the fact that since the road had been closed for like 24 hours, there was a mass of semis that were waiting to get out. That means that the road was just semi after semi and they would pass you and you couldn’t see anything at all for a few seconds as they would spray mist everywhere. Things got even worst when the sun went down, just outside of laramie. And we could only go like 50 miles per hour on average so things were taking FOR EVER! I drove for the entire 14 hours. We left at 7 AM and got home at 9PM. So 14 hours. With a 2 hour stop to see sing and wait for the road to open. PHew. The kids all ran off to do new years things. Oh yeah, it was new years eve. Tara and I unpacked. Inspected the new baseboards and trim and made it to 1130 before crashing.